Rotating EAs causing concern for parents of special needs child

Q: School is about to start and I am concerned about our son. He is 14 and autistic. He has lots of disruptive behaviours. We always meet with the teacher and resource people but never with our son’s educational assistant.

It seems the EA is always changing but that is the person who spends most time with our son. He needs consistency. What do we do?

A: Supporting students with disruptive behaviour is a challenge for many school boards.

The person most often responsible on a day-to-day basis is the educational assistant (EA).

Not all schools or school boards have the EA participate in educational planning meetings. Where the EA doesn’t participate, there can be a breakdown in communication with respect to the parental concerns as well as the actual educational plan, regardless of how well written.

Parent can ask that the EA be present at educational planning meetings. It is up to the school or board to make that decision and issue a reponse.

EAs often have to manage very troublesome behaviour, which at times can be remarkably violent. As a result, the EA is at risk of physical and emotional harm while doing their job in a stressful work environment. In circumstances such as these, it is not uncommon for workers to need time off to heal from injury or stress.

EAs may also be rotated between students to share the challenge of care. While most students who require the services of an EA would benefit from a consistent service provider, the challenges of the job may make it impossible for the same person to always be with any particular student.

Because of this challenging role and the staff changes, communication of the educational plan becomes of utmost importance.

Parents can ask to review the educational plan to assure it is written in such a way that any new worker would be able to implement it.

If you think the plan is unclear or ambiguous, you can raise this issue with the teacher or resource staff. Ask for any unclear or ambiguous strategies to be rewritten so that any new worker reading it would be able to pick up where the previous worker left off.

You can also ask to speak with the EA directly, but this too remains at the discretion of the school or the board.